a life, in 3

I.

you were born in a dry, poor valley in central california,

raised with sun beating down on your skin and vineyards rotting around your.

you were the only gringa on your block,

the only alabaster-skinned baby babbling in spanish

under the close supervision of the abuelitas who called your mama mija.

it was a childhood spent

with scuffed knees and dirty fingernails, holes in t-shirts mended with crooked stitches.

past the dilapidated houses,

past the bodegas and bakeries,

you learned how to read under mama’s close eye,

her calloused hand flipping pages for you

her heart swelling with each passing word.

past the wrong side of the tracks,

past the smokey bars and marketplaces,

you sounded out syllables and consonants,
reached for books bigger than you were,
felt for pages dog-eared and folded from use.

when sirens echoed around broken buildings,

you found comfort
in the silent solace of

words.

when hunger pangs ached in an angry stomach,
words filled your head,

filled what they could help with.

when a familiar face turned sinister

and took cruel hands to touch and defile,

you found words,

in the deepest reaches

of a sorrowed soul.

you found

words

flowing like

wine or water or gospel.

you found

strength

in pages of dickinson,

whitman,

hughes.

you found

worth

in a little girl
too small
to reach her aching fists around the world
a world that belonged to her.

words give and shake and breathe,

and take and shape and change,
like real things,

like living creatures.

they hold and warm and love.

they take a burden too unbearable to name,

like mothers,

like fathers,

like old friends.

II.

idaho is 83,642 square miles of approximately nothing, nothing but acres of ennui layered above your skin like a thick blanket of stagnancy and mind-decay.

they shipped you out when you were older, figured you could withstand the changes.

you could.

you were smart when you got here, smarter than kids your age and smarter than grown-ups who condescended you and smarter than the little pond you’d been confined to.

big fish- that was you, ambitious and striving and ready to change the world that belonged to you, with your tiny, aching fingers, ready to run laps around whatever came your way.

big fish- like a shark in a tank full of goldfish, like a dagger in a drawer full of butter knives.

big fish- whispered in hallways, like your ruthlessness and wit were things to be laughed at, ha ha ha look at her doesn’t she do anything fun doesn’t she have any friends doesn’t she-

big fish- like a running joke.

how many times can they pick on you for burying your nose in a book before you stop burying your nose in a book?

big fish- harpooned and brought ashore, strung up by the ink and rotting paper of books thrown into the ocean.

III.

you’re older, now.

still don’t read.

don’t do much, anymore.

there are all these-

letters

to decipher.

mdd.

ocd.

bpd.

ptsd.

they never shorten

the big one-

schizoaffective disorder, depressive type.

basically,

you hear voices.

they never disturb you-

just depress you.

they’re meaner than

the kids at school were.

the big fish is dead,

ambition in the dumpster,

words all but forgotten

in place of lethargy,

hopelessness,

helplessness,

mind-decay of your own making.

you are smart, still,

but you don’t read.

it is too painful,
too hard to hear
the book's words
over the words
shouted in your ears.
 

you are sixteen when you're assigned a book report.

it is a thick, elegant tome you have to read,

full of pretty words that hit your heart dead-on

and suddenly

and suddenly-

you are six years old again

and grasping for pages.

you memorize whole passages,

lips moving when you read them, as though to speak,

as though to sing your heart’s song.

when you read,

when you write,

when you use the power of these intangible, incredible things,

the voices don't say anything,

anything at all.

the words are a comfort blanket.

warmth and light and love,

like living creatures,

like old friends.